


Equations, Relations, and Conversations

by VioletWiz



Series: A Lotta Brains and No Polish [2]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: College AU, Columbia University, Dialogue Heavy, Eliza's a nerd, F/M, First Hamilton fic, Fluff, Hamilton's a nerd, More Fluff, Omigod so much fluff, they're all nerds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-16
Updated: 2017-01-16
Packaged: 2018-09-17 09:14:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,355
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9315038
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VioletWiz/pseuds/VioletWiz
Summary: Alex has always done well in every class he's ever taken that he put work into (which is all of them). Then he hits calculus. Lucky for him, Columbia's academic center just hired a new peer tutor...





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [quantumoddity](https://archiveofourown.org/users/quantumoddity/gifts).



> Gifting this to quantumoddity because I love love love her Hamliza fics. Check them out!

Hamilton felt a little odd walking through the glass doors of Columbia University's tutoring center for the first time. He prided himself on his easy grasp of the coursework at Columbia, an Ivy League school, but his recent foray into calculus had severely bruised his ego. It took a D- on the first test to force him to seek help, since his pride and his usual academic prowess were nearly always through the roof. But shame is a powerful motivator, and Alex was not about to allow one class destroy his GPA for all the people that funded his education to see. 

He sheepishly walked toward the front desk and asked when he could get a tutor for Calc I.

"Actually, there's someone free now. Take a left, second door on the right."

 _Great,_ thought Alex.

He followed the receptionist's instructions to a simple, clear glass door. If he had gone into one of the other similar study rooms, he might have noticed the whiteboards covering three of the walls, the window letting light in from the clear autumn sun setting in the sky, or the table in the middle of the room with two sturdy chairs.

But he didn't notice any of those things, because his eyes first caught the beautiful young woman smiling sunnily at him, her eyes glinting with excitement. 

"HI! You must be here for tutoring?"

Hamilton was a little confused at her enthusiasm, but nodded.

"Great! Just take a seat and tell me what you need help with."

He sat down and pulled out his test, which looked like it had been in a vicious gang fight from all the red pen marks on every single page. The tutor furrowed her brow and cringed.

"Yikes. This is the first test?" 

"Uh huh." 

"Ok, um, well, I guess we should start at the basics? Let's derive some simple polynomials."

While the tutor wrote out the first problem, Alex couldn't help but look at her straight black hair, her gentle cheekbones, and the faint smile that lingered on her face. He'd decided to politely introduce himself. What came out of his mouth, however, was slightly different.

"I'M ALEX!"

The tutor glanced at him, a mix of confusion and amusement painting her face.

"I mean, hi, my name is Alexander Hamilton. I didn't introduce myself earlier, that was probably rude and-." 

He was cut off by seeing the tutor's friendly, welcoming smile, and her extended hand to shake.

"My name's Eliza!"

"Nice to meet you, Eliza." Alex watched as she finished writing her set of problems for Alex to complete, then slid the paper over to him.

"You up for the challenge, Alex?" She joked, laughing when she saw the smirk on his face, his eyes sparkling with determination.

"These problems aren't even gonna know what hit them!"

Unfortunately for Hamilton, his confidence was mostly bravado. The first few problems were simple enough, but he soon began to struggle on a derivative that included trig functions.

_Ok, so the derivative of sine is cosine, right? But what about the x-5? Does the constant carry over? Does the cosine become negative? And what about the +5x at the end?_

Eliza tapped him on the shoulder after seeing his face screw up in frustration.

He looked up from his paper, annoyed at being interrupted in the middle of his thought process (although his brain's thoughts currently most closely resembled a phone's busy tone at the moment)

"Do you need some help?"

"No, I can get this!" Alex stubbornly insisted. 

Eliza tilted her head and raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure?"

Hamilton was offended at this perceived lack of intelligence. "For sure! Just give me time."

"I already gave you time, Alex," she huffed and turned to him, looking a surprised Alex straight in the eyes. "Look, I know being tutored isn't the most fun, but there's no point in coming unless I actually help you!"

Eliza saw Alex's expression drop, and she quickly exclaimed, "Oh no no no, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, it's just you need to accept help in order to get better you know?"

Hamilton kept looking at the problem. 

Eliza's expression softened. "Look, it probably isn't fun to have something be hard for you. I mean you go to Columbia! Obviously this isn't the norm. But part of being intelligent is knowing when you have to accept help. All I want to do is help!" 

Alex finally turned to face her sympathetic expression. "I'm sorry, I guess I'm just not used to having help offered." he said shyly.

Eliza looked baffled for a moment, then grabbed her pencil. "Well then, I guess I'll just have to take initiative myself!"

Through the next two hours, Eliza stepped him through every single problem type he got wrong on the test, and Alex could've swore he felt the mental connections being made in his head. Finally, calculus began to make some sense to him. But every time he saw Eliza focused on him and his work, or thinking with a pencil between her lips, or simply showing him the steps of math, his heart had a certain fullness he had not felt since he was a little kid. 

Eliza's watch beeped at the end of the session. "Oh, time's up! Well, um, was I able to help you today, Alex?"

"Of course! I never thought I say this, but I kinda enjoyed calculus!"

_Maybe for different reasons than math alone, but still._

Eliza beamed. "Oh I'm so glad! I wasn't sure if I would do well." Her expression became one of playful secretiveness, and she put a hand to one side of her mouth. "Can I tell you something?"

"Of course."

Eliza began to smile again giddily. "Today was my first day as a tutor!"

Alex was honestly amazed. "I had no idea! Trust me, you did really well."

As Eliza smiled warmly at him, he became entranced by her soft face and tender eyes. 

"Um, Eliza, when do you get done working here?"

"Right now, actually. Why?" she asked innocently.

"I was wondering if you wanted to grab a coffee or something? To celebrate your first day?"

Eliza thought for a moment. "Sure, why not? I could definitely use the caffeine."

Eliza and Alex went to the Starbucks that was (very conveniently) located right next to the tutoring center. While they were waiting in line, Eliza turned hesitantly to Alex. 

"By the way, I'm so sorry about what I said to you at the beginning of tutoring."

Now it was Alex's turn to be confused. "What do you mean?"

"I forget that not everyone at Columbia has had as good of an upbringing as I did. When you said you weren't used to accepting help... I just had no idea."

"It's no big deal, Eliza. Honestly, you were right. I can't expect to get everything, right?"

"I just hope that you.. oh gosh!" Eliza saw Alex looking at her with such tenderness that she started to giggle.

Eliza shyly smiled, and Alex felt his heart melt. 

When they got to the counter, John saw Hamilton, then Eliza, and rolled his eyes.

"Oh my god dude, what took you so long?"

Hamilton laughed and paid for his and Eliza's coffees. as he turned to walk out the door, he could've sworn he saw Laurens wink at him.

"You wanna have our coffees outside?"

"Sure!"

Eliza and Alex found a bench in the quad covered by an oak tree that was probably as old as the campus itself. After a couple minutes of content silence, Eliza and Alex sipping their drinks side by side, Alex turned to Eliza, a serious expression on his face.

"Eliza, I don't think you can tutor me at the center anymore."

"Why?" she questioned in disappointment.

Alex smirked and raised his eyebrows. "Conflict of interests."

Eliza rolled her eyes playfully. "Is this your way of asking me out?"

"Maaaaaaybe."

"Well, as corny as that was, it worked."

She grabbed his shoulders and kissed him sweetly, underneath the vibrant oranges and pinks of the setting New York City sky.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, hope you liked it! Constructive criticism is appreciated :)


End file.
